gooddelta

Add The Spodic Empire to that, a beauty and a big standout musically in this semi. I hope it doesn't live up to all the predix in this thread. I actually think Semi 2 has no very clear DNQs at all so there could be a lot of surprises there.

Smash Mouth. Joe's is rather bland but Atomic Kitten did a fun cover of it in 2000.

Intriguing selection. I have several of these albums but don't in every case remember the songs chosen. I always thought that Dido track was a single, but I'm misremembering (must have just been a strong album highlight). I bought a Jurgen Vries cover of it in 2004 that went top 30.

F*ck the niche, this is POP! After three months of sending quite niche entries, which resulted in a DNQ for traditional Turkish, a last place in the final for a stirring new age piece, and then a more respectable 24th place for spoken word electronic, FSR Rontvia has come back to pop, albeit with a punk edge. PUNCHBAG are a new London act featuring siblings Clara & Anders Bach, with Aron Murphy on drums and Darcey Beth on bass. Signed to UK label Mute, Clash described the act as having "a luminescent sense of pop imagination, one that powers past accepted boundaries" while with "day-glo colours matched to a punk-like sense of confrontation, the drama in their work is unavoidably over-powering". Debut single F*ck It is an out and out spiky pop track, albeit with a punk attitude and an explicit chorus followed by a Eurodance synth breakdown where the colours explode. Taking about the lyrics, Clara Bach commented: "It’s not nihilistic. It’s more like, we only have so much time, so do the thing you want to do. Kiss the person you want to kiss, say that thing you want to say.” Ricardo Delta added: "We don't usually send stuff that's quite as in your face as this, but f*ck it, now was the time to send this track. For us, it's like the music of Xenomania, Rogue Traders, Dragonette and Confidence Man thrown into a blender with a heavy dose of Where's Your Head At by Basement Jaxx. It may only run for 2:16, our second shortest entry ever, but it certainly does pack quite a punch(bag) in that time, we're obsessed!" F*ck It is currently at No.2 in the Rontvian charts, just behind the biggest selling song of the year to date, Bara Bada Bastu by KAJ. Click the link to watch the fun and colourful video, it's age restricted!

For sure, Dario G, one of my favourite covers. They really did a nice job with that, lovely vocal and production.

He was on most of them, Stephen had co-lead vocals on a few singles, like No Matter What and I Love The Way You Love Me. Mikey was actually lead singer on their first single in Ireland, Working My Way Back To You. Ronan did co-write Picture Of You so it’s fair he took the lead on this one. It’s a real shame it couldn’t overtake Puff Daddy, it’s definitely one of their best singles and the only one I ever hear on the radio still these days. Everybody is a classic too though and more fool the label for not backing the video concept, it’s an iconic video that helped make the song a Halloween classic despite its summer release. Always liked Bitch too, ridiculously catchy and it was fun to sing along to as a kid as it felt mildly rebellious to shout that chorus 😂

Going for P!nk again.

S Club 8. Shame for 3LW, nice little song!

Nickelback on this occasion. I don’t mind that Westlife track, they had worse that got to No.1 before it imo.

Adele, but the Devlin cover was ok. I liked his non-charting song Community Outcast most.

Love the colour scheme and split of the semis by colour - amazing work/concept! A few eyebrow-raising artists as always. Nice to see a couple of Rontvian recycles in Elsiane and Zaho De Sagazan <3 Of course, I'm in the opposite semi to both oops.

Nice restart, I've got a lot of time for Lenny Kravitz too, I very often like his stuff and he does the tender/soulful songs just as well as the rock. One Of Us was very striking lyrically. I really like that Cardigans track too. Glad to see this back!

My first full ranking: Amazing 01 🇸🇪 Sweden - Kaj - Bara Bada Bastu Great 02 🇩🇪 Germany - Abor & Tynna - Baller 03 🇦🇱 Albania - Shkodra Elektronike – Zjerm 04 🇫🇮 Finland - Erika Vikman - Ich komme 05 🇬🇧 United Kingdom - Remember Monday - What The Hell Just Happened Very good 06 🇲🇹 Malta - Miriana Conte - Serving 07 🇦🇺 Australia - GO-JO - Milkshake Man 08 🇨🇭 Switzerland - Zoë Më - Voyage 09 🇩🇰 Denmark - Sissal - Hallucination 10 🇫🇷 France - Louane - Maman 11 🇸🇲 San Marino - Gabry Ponte - Tutta L'Italia 12 🇱🇻 Latvia - Tautumeitas - Bur man laimi Good 13 Luxembourg - Laura Thorn - La Poupée Monte Le Son 14 🇱🇹 Lithuania - Katarsis - Tavo akys 15 🇺🇦 Ukraine - Ziferblat - Bird of Pray 16 🇵🇱 Poland - Justyna Steczkowska - Gaja 17 🇳🇱 Netherlands - Claude - C'est La Vie 18 🇮🇹 Italy - Lucio Corsi - Volevo essere un duro 19 🇨🇾 Cyprus - Theo Evan - Shh 20 🇦🇹 Austria - JJ - Wasted Love 21 🇬🇷 Greece - Klavdia - Asteromata Ok 22 🇪🇪 Estonia - Tommy Cash - Espresso Machiato 23 🇧🇪 Belgium - Red Sebastian - Strobe Light 24 🇸🇮 Slovenia - Klemen - How Much Time Do We Heve Left 25 🇮🇸 Iceland - Vaeb - Roa 26 🇳🇴 Norway - Kyle Alessandro - Lighter 27 🇨🇿 Czechia - Adonxs - Kiss Kiss Goodbye 28 🇦🇲 Armenia - PARG – Survivor 29 🇮🇪 Ireland - Emmy - Laika Party 30 🇵🇹 Portugal - NAPA - Deslocado 31 🇪🇸 Spain - Melody - Esa Diva 32 🇲🇪 Montenegro - Nina Žižić - Dobrodošli No 33 🇦🇿 Azerbaijan - Mamagama - Run with U 34 🇷🇸 Serbia - Princ – Mila 35 🇭🇷 Croatia - Marko Bošnjak – Poison Cake 36 🇬🇪 Georgia - Mariam Shengelia - Freedom 37 🇮🇱 Israel - Yuval Raphael - New Day Will Rise On balance, there are a few more songs this year that I enjoy than last year (this time last year I had 18 good or above). Sweden I like more than any entry from the 2024 contest.

I definitely prefer the studio version. It's quite a tender song to have debuted on such a HUGE stage like that. Not that she didn't do it justice, but it will probably work better in the smaller setting of Basel and with proper staging.

This was one of the most hyped Eurovision songs I can ever remember, and it doesn't fully justify the build up for me. It's a perfectly nice ballad, but I think Switzerland is a little more my cup of tea even in terms of the French ballads. And it might steal some of those jury votes away. France is dropping in the odds following the reveal, but I agree it's still in the mix to win if it can win the jury and come top five on the televote (4-6 feels realistic there imo).

I can't believe I didn't think to send The Riddle, love that version!

JADE – FUFN (F**k You For Now) (early 2010s Saturdays meets Gaga vibes was never going to miss with me, love it) Chappell Roan – The Giver (can't decide between the top two, I love this too - but going to give it to JADE on this occasion) Sugababes – Jungle (very fresh and solid comeback) Lil Nas X – HOTBOX (cool 00s Pharrell vibes to this - would be higher on a weaker week) Tom Grennan – Boys Don't Cry (good 80s vibe, solid track) Lizzo – Still Bad Gwen Stefani – Still Gonna Love You (quite boring, sadly, although the original parent album was too) Dermot Kennedy – Let Me In (meh, I saw him live a few years back and he was great but I haven't enjoyed a single of his in a long time)

Pirates certainly picked up the silent votes there, I barely saw it mentioned in the threads before. I thought it was a decent response record with a smooth vocal from Shola Ama. Going for Sundown again here.

Knowing Chappell’s career trajectory though, some other song from her album would have blown up out of nowhere, she seems to go viral with everything. I don’t think she could have waited forever, as it is it’s her first new release in nearly a year. She must be so eager to get new stuff out by now, some of the songs on her album are half a decade old. However well or not The Giver does this week, it will probably have a second wind in about six months time regardless 😂 country songs have a tendency to have legs in the charts here as people can take longer to warm up to them and radio pick them up more gradually over time. I’m really into it myself so I hope it is a decent hit.

Cool to see the extended version of Picture Of You on there. I've got that on a compilation somewhere of 90s 12" versions.

Placebo but both are very strong.

Very easy - Aaliyah, what a gem and what a talent.

Gone for P!nk, sorry. For me it just didn’t click as a lead single. I only enjoyed God Is A DJ from that album’s singles run.

3 is ok with me. I tend to vote in them all together so doesn’t really matter too much to me if it’s 2 or 3.

Oh, I wasn't expecting FUFN. Early 2010s style pop banger, love it. Jungle and The Giver are also very much up my street, so will have to vote later once I've had a few plays.